1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to the archiving of data and more particularly relates to time sensitive encrypted archiving of detailed bid information in the construction industry.
2. Related Art
In the construction industry, the process of bidding a job is considered to be very proprietary by each contractor. The methods used to arrive at costs for certain portions of a project are often highly secret and the numbers used to compute a summary bid are typically very well protected, indeed.
A substantial portion of the costs incorporated into a bid is typically due to the expenses associated with estimating the job, participating in the bidding process, managing sub-contractors, obtaining financing, and contingency planning. Often times, major cost overruns are experienced due to errors in preparing the estimated bid. Additionally, significant costs are also incurred for dispute resolution between the contractor and the job owner resulting from change orders and other situations that arise after the job has been awarded.
A particular problem associated with cost estimation and related to change orders and contingency management is the lack of sufficient detail in the bids submitted to a job owner by a contractor. Although a job is awarded on the basis of a summary bid, the bid detail, which is highly proprietary to the contractor, is usually needed to resolve disputes that arise between the contractor and the job owner. A significant drawback of the conventional bidding systems is that when the bid detail is provided for dispute resolution, the content of the bid detail is often subject to scrutiny and the veracity of the party providing the bid detail is nearly always called into question. This problem persists because of the highly confidential nature of the detailed bid information and a contractor's reluctance to provide any job owner or other unrelated party with this proprietary information.
Thus, the conventional bidding systems have created a need that remains unmet by the industry. Therefore, what is needed is a system and method that allows the detailed bid information used to prepare a bid for a job to remain confidential and also allows the same detailed bid information to be available for dispute resolution with an authenticated chain of custody.